May 2017

NZMS 2017 conference
For those of you not already familiar with the awesome line-up of speakers for this year’s NZ Microbiological Society conference (in Auckland, 20-23 November), please check out the conference website http://www.nzmsconference.org.nz/speakers/

In terms of relevance for microbial ecologists as well as those interested in the human microbiome, there is an extremely strong line-up as follows:

Microbial ecology-relevant Plenary Speakers:
**Colin Murrell (University of East Anglia, UK) – Colin is current ISME President and has published >300 articles on the ecology and physiology of methane-oxidising bacteria and related organisms. His lab also invented the widely used technique of DNA stable isotope probing (DNA-SIP).
Noah Fierer (University of Colorado, USA) – Noah is arguably the world’s leading exponent of 16S rRNA-based microbial community analyses, applying this approach and others to soil bacteria as well as those in built environments and the atmosphere.